what people really do in their
lives rather than what they think they are doing or what they believe they
should be doing. In most societies there is a discrepancy between
these three kinds of behavior. It is important for anthropologists
to distinguish between actual, believed, and ideal behavior when they learn about another society and its
culture.

a behavior, strategy, or
technique for obtaining food and surviving in a particular environment.
Successful adaptive mechanisms provide
a selective advantage in the competition for survival with other life
forms. For humans, the most important adaptive mechanism is
culture.

the broad
scientific study of human culture and biology. Anthropologists are
interested in what it is to be human in all of our many different
societies around the world today and in the past. In North American
universities, the study of anthropology is usually divided into four main
sub-disciplines:
cultural anthropology,
physical
anthropology, archaeology,
and linguistics.

the systematic
study of the material remains of human behavior in the past.
Archaeologists reconstruct the prehistory and early history of societies
and their cultures through an examination and interpretation of such
things as house foundations, broken tools, and food refuse.

what people honestly believe that
they are doing in their lives rather than what they think they should be
doing or what they actually are doing. In most societies there is a
discrepancy between these three kinds of behavior.
It is important for anthropologists to distinguish between actual,
believed, and ideal behavior when they learn about another society and its
culture.

gestures, facial
expressions, and body postures that people use to communicate along with
or instead of speech. Body language is also referred to as kinesics
.
Waving good-bye with a hand and arm or winking one eye to indicate a
shared secret are examples of body language in North America. Body
language is learned as part of a culture.

the full range of learned
behavior patterns that are acquired by people as members of a society.
A culture is a complex, largely interconnected whole that consists of the knowledge, belief, art, law, morals, customs, skills, and
habits learned from parents and others in a society. Culture is the
primary adaptive
mechanism for humans.

the study of contemporary and recent historical
cultures all over the world. The focus is on social organization,
culture change, economic and political systems, and religion.
Cultural anthropology is also referred to as social or sociocultural anthropology.

suspending one's
ethnocentric judgments
in order to understand and appreciate another culture.
Anthropologists try to learn about and interpret the
various aspects of the culture they are studying in reference to that
culture rather than to their own. This provides a better
understanding of how such practices as polygamy and cannibalism can
function and even support other cultural traditions.

cultural traits that
are shared by all of humanity collectively. Examples of such general
traits are communicating with a verbal language, using age and gender to
classify people, and raising children in some sort of family setting.
No matter where people live in the world, they share these universal
cultural traits. However, different cultures have developed their
own specific ways of carrying out or expressing these general traits.

a feeling of confusion, distress, and sometimes
depression that can result from the psychological stress
that commonly occurs during the first weeks or months of a total cultural
emersion in an alien society. Until the new culture becomes familiar
and comfortable, it is common to have difficulty in communicating and to
make frustrating mistakes. This is usually compounded by feelings of
homesickness. These feelings can be emotionally debilitating.
However, culture shock eventually passes for most people. See
future shock.

the movement of cultural traits
and ideas from one society or ethnic group to another. While the
form of a trait may be transmitted to another society, the original
meaning may not. For instance, McDonald's hamburgers are
thought of as a cheap, quick meal in North America, but they are
generally considered to be a special occasion food in Beijing, China.

a group of individuals arranged
in rank order in terms of relative dominance and subservience. In
some non-human primate species, each community has a distinct male and
female dominance hierarchy. Every individual is ranked relative to
all other community members of the same gender. Those who are higher
in the dominance hierarchy usually have greater access to food, sex, and
other desirable things.

the deep felt belief that your culture is superior to all others.
Being fond of your own way of life and condescending or even hostile
toward other cultures is normal for all people. Alien culture traits
are often viewed as being not just different but less sensible and even
"unnatural." Ethnocentrism is normal for all people in the world.
See cultural
relativity.

anthropological research in which
one learns about the
culture of another society through fieldwork and first hand observation in that
society. Ethnography is also the term used to refer to books or
monographs describing what was learned about the culture of a society.

an anthropological study that systematically
compares similar cultures.
An example of an ethnological study
would be a comparison of what cultures are like in societies that have
economies based on hunting and gathering rather than agriculture.
The data for this sort of ethnology would come from the existing
ethnographies about these
peoples. In other words, an ethnology is essentially a synthesis of
the work of many ethnographers.

the kind of
culture shock that can
be experienced by members of a society who are undergoing too rapid of
culture change, usually as a result of diffusion of traits from other
societies and frequent inventions that alter significant portions of
daily life. Elderly people in the rapidly changing cultures of the
world sometimes experience this today. The concept of future shock
was developed by Alvin Toffler in his 1970 book entitled Future Shock.

the view that the people and
nations of the world should become more economically and politically
integrated and unified. Those who advocate globalism generally
believe that ethnocentrism,
nationalism, and
tribalism are obstacles that
must be overcome.

what people believe that they
should do in their
lives rather than what they think they are doing or what they actually are doing. In most societies there is a discrepancy between
these three kinds of behavior. It is important for anthropologists
to distinguish between them when they learn about another society and its
culture.

someone who is not only
knowledgeable about his or her own culture but who is able and willing to
communicate this knowledge in an understandable way to an anthropologist
or some other outsider. Ethnographers usually try to develop a warm and
trusting relationship with their informants. This makes it more
likely that they will learn what the informant's culture is really like.

a
probability sample
that includes only a limited number of key people selected by an
anthropologist to be his or her informants
based on the likelihood that they possess knowledge concerning the
research questions and will be most able to communicate it. For
example, religious leaders would be the most likely informants if research
concerns religious beliefs and practices. The judgment sample
approach works best if the focus of research concerns cultural information
that only some members of the host society possess.

marriage of one woman to one man at
a time. This is the most common marriage pattern around the world today. If remarriage is
allowed following divorce or death of a spouse, the marriage pattern could be defined as
being "serial monogamy."

physically and emotionally participating in the social interaction
of another society on a daily basis in order to learn about its culture.
In practice this usually requires living within the community as a member,
learning their language, establishing close friendship ties, eating what
they eat, and taking part in normal family activities. By becoming
an active participant rather than simply an observer, ethnographers reduce
the cultural distance between themselves and the host society.

the study of the
non-cultural, or biological, aspects of humans and near humans.
Physical anthropologists are usually involved in one of three different
kinds of research: 1) non-human primate studies (usually in the wild), 2)
recovering the fossil record of human evolution, and 3) studying human
biological diversity, inheritance patterns, and non-cultural means of
adapting to environmental stresses. Physical anthropology is also
referred to as biological anthropology.

the marriage of one man to several
women at the same time. This is the most common form of
polygamy. It often takes the form of "sororal polygyny", which is two or more sisters
married to the same man.

a sample of people that is
carefully chosen so that it will be representative of the entire community
or population. Choosing who will be in the sample can be difficult,
especially at the beginning of an
ethnographic research project when the
first contacts are made and the composition of the society and its culture
are still poorly understood.
Depending on the nature of the society and the research questions, one of
three different kinds of probability samples may be employed. They
are random
sample, stratified
sample, and judgment
sample.

a
probability sample
in which people are selected on a totally random, unbiased basis.
This can be accomplished by assigning a number to everyone in a community
and then letting a computer or hand calculator generate a series of random
numbers. If a 10% sample is needed, then the first 10% of the random
numbers will indicate who will be the focus of the research. This
sampling approach is reasonable for
ethnographic research only when there
does not seem to be much difference between the people in the population.
Since this is rarely the case, random sampling is not often used for
ethnographic research.

a group of interacting organisms. In the case of humans,
societies are groups of people who directly or indirectly interact with
each other. People in human societies also generally perceive that
their society is distinct from other societies in terms of shared
traditions and expectations.

a
probability sample
in which people are selected because they come from distinct sub-groups
within the society. This approach may be used by
ethnographers if
the information that is being sought is not specialized knowledge such as
the esoteric activities of a secret organization with restricted
membership.

a regional, social, or ethnic
group that is distinguishable from other groups in a society. Members of a subculture often share a common identity, food
tradition, dialect or language, and other cultural traits that come from
their common ancestral background and experience. Subcultures are
most likely to exist in complex, diverse societies, such as the U.S. and
Canada, in which people have come from many different parts of the world.

a profound loyalty to one's tribe
or ethnic group and a rejection of others. Those who promote
tribalism generally
believe that globalism is a
threat that must be overcome. A pattern of
establishing ethnically "pure" nations through aggressive "ethnic
cleansing" occurred in the former Yugoslavia during the 1990's.
Similar attempts to carve out tribal based nations have occurred in the
former republics of the Soviet Union and in a number of African nations.